A summer day in 2007, I was laying naked at Collins beach on Sauvie Island, just outside of Portland. Because I am, or rather WAS a redhead, I need to be in part shade or dappled sunlight. I was surrounded by dozens of hot gay men, at their little setups on the beach, alone & in groups. I didn’t want to be doing it. I was embarrassed. I wanted to appear hot, yet cool. But, I had burst into tears & was whimpering like a little girl while reading Armistead Maupin’s new installment of the Tales Of The City series- Michael Tolliver Lives. I was shedding tears for the reunion with some of my favorite characters in literature, but also for my own loss of innocence & the glance at my own mortality. But mostly, I was crying for the beauty of the writing, & the pleasure of having the main character- Michael Tolliver still be alive after a presumed early death from HIV.
I read the original Tales Of The City in the serial installments from the San Francisco Chronicle, alerted to them from friends in the city. I savored each one. Maupin revived the Dickensian serial novel, which makes you laugh, makes you cry, & makes you wait for the next episode. I had a real romance with San Francisco in the 1970s, & spent as much time there as I could muster. I was living in L.A., & PSA Airlines (now long gone) had a “Midnight Flyer”, a no reservations, stand in line, $20 flight from LAX to SFO. I would take advantage of the deal. The Midnight Flyer was my introduction to the Mile High Club. Only in the 1970s, could a young man travel to the City By The Bay to get laid, & then have it happen on the flight there. I didn’t even need to touch ground!
As each new book in the series would be released, I would get myself to the Different Drummer Bookstore (in the 1970s & 1980s there were actual Gay Bookstores) on Capitol Hill-Seattle & I would purchase the latest installment of Tales Of The City. I wouldn’t read it though. I would go back to book #1 & start at the very beginning. It was 18 years between Sure Of You & Michael Tolliver Lives. It was great, if slightly emotional, to be back with my friends from Barbary Lane.
Armistead Maupin is a Southern Gentleman born to a conservative, Christian family in Washington, D.C., & raised in North Carolina.He attended the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Maupin worked at WRAL-TV in Raleigh, a station then managed by future U.S. Senator Jesse Helms. Helms nominated Maupin for a patriotic award, which he won. Maupin says he was a typical conservative & even a segregationist at this time & he admired Helms, a family friend. He later condemned Helms at a gay pride parade on the steps of the North Carolina State Capitol. Maupin is a veteran of the United States Navy; he served several tours of duty including one in Vietnam during the Vietnam War. Maupin claims he was gay since childhood but didn't have sex until he was 26 & only decided to come out in 1974.
Maupin's former partner of 12 years, Terry Anderson, was journalist & gay rights activist. Ian McKellen is a friend & former lover, & Christopher Isherwood was a mentor, friend, & influence as a writer. He was once a fuck buddy of Rock Hudson: 'I'm the age now that Rock was when he picked me up, so I can understand how he felt ,how his fame limited his freedom. You get kinder as you go along.”
Maupin has been married to Christopher Turner, a website producer & photographer since 2007, although they called each other married for several years before the ceremony in Vancouver BC. Up next: a new Tales Of The City- Mary Ann In Autumn & a musical version of Tales of the City with a score & lyrics by Jake Shears & John Garden of the rock band Scissor Sisters, & a book by Oregon’s own Jeff Whitty.
Thank you, Mr. Maupin for 35 years of terrific reading!
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